Joe Ludwig (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Government Business in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

The Foreign Evidence Act 1994 provides a means of adducing foreign material obtained through mutual assistance as evidence in Australian criminal and related proceedings. The Foreign Evidence Amendment Bill 2008 would streamline the process for adducing foreign evidence, particularly where that evidence is a business record. The bill as proposed to be amended by the government amendments would displace the operation of the rule against hearsay with respect to foreign business records—that is, foreign business records could be adduced even when the record contains hearsay evidence provided that the other evidentiary requirements in the particular jurisdiction are satisfied.

The amendments would also enable the court to examine foreign material and draw inferences from the material in order to establish the material as a business record that may be adduced and would remove a provision of the bill which would have given the court the discretion to limit the use to be made of foreign material. It will remove a provision of the bill which would have created a presumption that foreign material complied with the testimony requirements in the Foreign Evidence Act and will make minor consequential amendments to the application provision. This would assist in relation to complex prosecutions involving the use of evidence obtained overseas, including investigations into people smuggling and associated conduct such as the provision of material support and laundering the proceeds of criminal activity. With those short words, I commend the bill to the Senate.